Wonders and EB

**khelvan** · 02-03-2005, 19:51

I am curious to get your feedback on something. We're currently having an internal debate about the Wonders. These wonders have HUGE bonuses that completely imbalance the game. A proposal has been made to remove the wonders as there is no way to edit these bonuses or remove the bonuses and keep the wonders. The majority of us feel that because these bonuses create such ahistorical results that there is no room for them in a mod that is supposedly about historical accuracy. However, others fell that these should not be removed for the "fun" factor, and are suggesting we should find some way to compensate for them in the system. Since we can't add our own bonuses to the wonders, this is impossible, so if they remain they will remain with the hugely imbalancing bonuses. I guess Civilizations has had quite an impact on some of our gamers.

However, we are working on a conceptual solution for this - we may be able to add them as an indestructable building to the province itself, and have it show up on the city view near or in the city where it is appropriate to do so. We would give these "Wonders" a very modest bonus, one that affects the city, not the whole faction. If we do this, we may be able to add even more "Wonders" of our own. However, we will not be able to get these "Wonders" to show up on the campaign map. This idea has not yet been confirmed to work through testing, so we may not be able to do it.

So in the end, right now, this comes down to - Wonders (with huge bonuses to whole factions, show up on campaign map) or no Wonders?

We are curious about your opinion. Keep in mind our stated goal is historical accuracy.

**jimmyM** · 02-03-2005, 20:06

If you could have the wonders remaining as purely "window dressing" for the provinces/cities posessing them, fine (with the patch, things like this apparently show up) I'm not particularly enamoured with the massive bonuses some cultures get for posessing them, although I guess it does give some point other than a purely aesthetic one to capturing them...

**Crownsteler** · 02-03-2005, 20:07

I'd say keep the wonders! They are cool and really add to the fun of the game. It doesn't matter to me that they are unrealistic (well, most of them are, some aren't tho), you can never obtain complete historic realism with this game anyway, so can't you just leave this feature in??? If you really don't want to leave them, at least go with the option of putting them inside the city!

but i can't vote yet... :S

**Big_John** · 02-03-2005, 20:10

given the choices in the poll, i had to vote yes. but i prefer your "conceptual solution" about a million to one over the poll choices. why wouldn't you be able to add models (of new wonders) to the campaign map? can you add 2-d images to it? is there anything CA didn't hardcode in this 'mod-friendly' game?

argh.

edit: crownsteler, realism isn't the only concern in this case. the wonders are horribly imbalancing; that's the main problem.

**Crownsteler** · 02-03-2005, 20:15

@ Big John

bah, the statue at rhodes is usually the only thing that keeps my economy going

**RedGhost** · 02-03-2005, 20:24

The experience system is equally unrealistic (imagine 150 years old veterans beating the snot out of 20 year old fresh recruits), but it does add to the gameplay. I say, keep the wonders, even with reduced bonuses. They give more of an incentive to conquer a given province, and are fun.

**khelvan** · 02-03-2005, 20:38

Let me be clear - we CANNOT reduce the bonuses of these campaign map wonders.

Obviously if we remove them from the campaign map our preference would be to add them into the cities/provinces. This would be our goal, not to simply remove them completely. This is how we can reduce the bonus.

Inherent in a "yes" vote is the attempt by EB to get these working properly on the city view. We could probably have the icon show up on the campaign map but if you moused over it the tooltip would show some generic name, not the Wonder name. Yes, this is the "wonderful" moddable game that we were promised.

We would never remove them completely without attempting to get them working in the city view. However, we can NOT keep them as is, working properly on the campaign map, and reduce the bonuses. Their bonuses are hard-coded, or we would have simply removed the bonuses and be done with it, keeping the wonders there as eye candy, no need for a poll!

RedGhost - so, since one area of the mod will be unrealistic, we should therefore not attempt to make other areas of the game realistic? What sense does that make? We might as well not try to make ANYTHING realistic using this logic.

**RedGhost** · 02-03-2005, 20:55

Khelvan: obviously, a balance has to be reached between gameplay and complete realism. The question being, does removing the wonders significantly decrease the fun of the game? And: do wonders truly alter the realism of the game, enough that they should not be included in EB? If the latter was that obvious, there would be no need for a poll.
That said, I would have either the wonders stay or leave for good rather than having the release delayed because of a somewhat minor aspect of the game.

**eadingas** · 02-03-2005, 21:05

BTW Khel, the inclusion of wonders into the city HAS been tested, and it works - see the screenshots in the inner poll thread... the only thing that doesn't work is putting the wonders on the map somewhere else than cities.